Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Instead of driving to Florida or jetting to Mexico, a group of
Roosevelt University students spent spring break helping others in an
unusual destination – Goshen, Ind. Dedicated to the University’s social justice mission, 10 students
traveled to Goshen March 11-17 to fix up vacant homes with the
not-for-profit group, La Casa, Inc.

”Community service has always been important to me,” said Morrison, an
undergraduate political science major who was part of the Center for
Student Involvement ‘s third annual Alternative Break Immersion trip.
“It’s particularly important when you help people who can’t make do for
themselves,” she said.

In 2010, a group of Roosevelt students spent their spring break helping
at a community center in a small West Virginia town. In 2011, Roosevelt
students went to work at Benton House, a community center in in
Chicago’s Bridgeport neighborhood. This year, volunteers chose to help
in Elkhart County’s Goshen, Ind., which has been hard hit by the
recession, including foreclosures and unemployment, due in large part to
the collapse of its RV manufacturing industry.

“We took the trip to help out people who have fallen on hard times,”
said Katherine Mason, the Roosevelt career counselor who led student
volunteers in fixing three La Casa properties. “It was an eye-opening
experience to see how badly a small town like Goshen has suffered,” she
said.

Hannah Pilla, an undergraduate English major who has participated in all
three Alternative Break Immersion excursions and who helped organize
the trip to Goshen, said the experience was labor intensive but very
humbling.

“Every time I go on these trips, I realize I’m a lot more fortunate than
many people,” said Pilla. “When you see someone who doesn’t have a
place to live, it makes you feel lucky and good about yourself that you
can do something to help,” she said.

Abdas-Salam, a Chicago resident who also was part of the Alternative
Break Immersion trip last year, said the Indiana excursion was rewarding
in part because it opened her eyes to problems that families face in
semi-rural areas.

“I learned to get along with different types of people and it was great
to help these families with painting, roofing, gardening and a lot of
other things that needed to be done,” said Abdas-Salam, who wants to
enter the not-for-profit field after graduating in 2013.

During the trip, students also spent time working at a home for
recovering drug addicts and individuals with disabilities. They were
assisted in their volunteer work by student volunteers from Boston
University and by prison inmates doing community service. The group also
had the opportunity to have dinner with members of the area’s Amish
community.

Bailey Swinney, an undergraduate sociology major who went on the trip,
said one of the best experiences was taking a tour after working hours
in downtown Goshen where a guide from La Casa showed the group how
volunteer efforts over time have helped Goshen regain its economic
footing. “I loved having the opportunity to put social justice theories
discussed in Roosevelt’s different classes into action,” said Swinney.

The trip gave Emily Wilkie, an undergraduate majoring in sociology and
women’s and gender studies, a fresh, hands-on perspective on what it
means to be homeless, addicted and/or disabled.

“I learned a lot from the open and honest discussion members of our
group had. It was truly an amazing experience and I would recommend it
to anyone thinking about attending the Alternative Spring Break
Immersion trip next year,” she said.

Friday, March 23, 2012

The Mansfield Institute for Social Justice and
Transformation (MISJT) is pleased to announce its annual grant program to
support the development, teaching, and administration of transformational
service-learning courses at the university.Grants for faculty members have a $3,000 maximum amount, and
will support transformational learning classes to be offered in Fall 2012,
Spring 2013, and Summer 2013.

The brief application, along with an explanation of
transformational service-learning and the grant program, can be downloaded as
an MS Word document at http://tinyurl.com/misjt-2012rfp

Your application should be submitted as an attachment
to Steven Meyers at smeyers@roosevelt.edu by Monday, April 16, 2012. Applicants will be notified about
decisions within two to three weeks of the deadline. This grant program is
supported by funding from the McCormick Tribune Foundation.

Saturday, March 10, 2012

Students and faculty will be presenting the innovative work that connects teaching with outreach in the community. Stop by our celebrations at both campuses in April. Learn how social justice teaching and scholarship is leading to real change and how you can get involved next year.

Chicago Campus:

Thursday, April 185:00 p.m. Presentations about transformational service learning and the Scholar Activist Fellowship program in the Congress Lounge.6:00 p.m. Reception and celebration in the Fainman Lounge.

The Mansfield Institute at Roosevelt University is proud to support transformational service-learning. Instructors who incorporate service-learning into their classes have students serve in the community in ways that closely relate to their course material. Professors ensure that the service work is meaningful and meets the needs of both the student and the site. Students then reflect on their service and make connections to the class through assignments (such as journals, research papers, or other activities).

At Roosevelt University, we encourage faculty members to explicitly address social justice through their service-learning. Transformational service-learning encourages students to participate in the university's mission by allowing them to interact with underprivileged or socially marginalized people or in settings that serve these groups of people. Instructors who use transformational learning can also help students participate in civic or social action that focuses on ameliorating societal injustices.

Contact us at 312-341-2150 if we can support your use of this approach to teaching and learning in any way.